The Souvenirs of Sinners
by Caprica Janeway
Summary: With the return of Kara Thrace, Laura Roslin seeks out advice from an unexpected source. (set during 4x01, He That Believeth In Me)


"If you're here to catalogue my mistakes then I can save you the trouble. Over there is a list of my sins for your still yet to be formed commission."

Laura looked from Saul to the worn manila folder on his desk. Frayed at the corners, there were a number of brightly coloured post-it notes sticking out from the side. She remembered when they were first thrown together how confronting she found him. He seemed to be a man who lived in conflict with himself. Saul was the kind of person to bark orders, then stepping back as if reprimanding himself, he'd remember to say hello.

"Kara Thrace." She responded.

With an eyebrow raised, his lone eye scrutinising her, she hid her discomfort as she adjusted her posture. His sluggish response to her prompt put her immediately on the defence.

"You don't see her as a problem?" She added.

Saul put a hand to his cot and leaning as steady as he could, he rose and met her gaze. Apart from the file he had left for her, his desk was a mess of tattered personal effects he hadn't gotten around to throwing out. There were wrappers from a couple of cigars Bill had given him after the second exodus, a set of collectable Pyramid cards he had found while trading in Dogsville, pamphlets from some of Baltar's rabble raisers that he had swiftly confiscated, and then somewhere underneath the cards and the junk was a something softer.

"You think she's a cylon." He concluded.

"And you don't? She died, and she's back - how else do you explain it?"

Saul bent down and opened his draw. He knew she was watching him, but he didn't care right now. He pulled out a bottle and two glasses. Without asking her he began to pour drinks for the both of them. His interactions with Laura Roslin always required an element of negotiation. She didn't throw down her opinions in the way that Kara would, nor would she mull around a point till she'd figure it out for herself, like Bill would. No, Roslin always knew what she wanted to hear, she just wanted you to agree politely, and provide options for a solution.

"I'm not trying to explain it. It is what it is - frakked up. Of all the people to turn out to be Cylons..."

Laura decided to take the seat she hadn't been offered, and eye the drink she assumed was hers. Saul took her lead and pulled out the seat from under his desk and sat down.

"It could have been worse." She replied.

"Oh? How?"

Laura picked up her drink and tilted her head to the side. "Well it could have been you," she said taking a quick swill of the amber liquid.

He had a few seconds between her looking into her glass, and the moments after as she squinted while her body reacted to what was clearly a drink she was unaccustomed to. In those few moments he reacted, then reined himself in.

"I don't see how me being a toaster would be any worse than Kara."

"To Bill it would. You're his anchor…"

Saul raised an eyebrow to that.

"...his consistently present inconsistency. Whatever failings you think you have, he certainly doesn't see them that way. All he sees is a friend that can cut through all the crap, while still having an unwavering respect for the uniform."

Laura had adapted to the taste of the caustic amber liquid by her third swill, and pressed her lips together as she watched Saul take in her words.

"Why are you here Madame President? Bill already has your voice in his ear, whatever you want done with Kara he's sure to listen."

Laura looked over the desk of papers, wrappers, and random objects that sat in stark contrast between the rest of the military decor. She brushed her hand against the surface and allowed her fingers to flick over one of the wrappers that easily crackled under her touch.

"I wanted to know what you meant when we were in the CIC. You said that something had changed. What did you mean by that?"

Saul tensed. Of all the words she had to remember. His slip of tongue, a revelation of non-specifics, and now she wanted details. "Something felt off... about the attack; the way the Cylons came out of nowhere, Baltar's trial. Everything felt shook up and out of place - like after the election. Being on these old Battlestars for years, you gain a sense of things - an instinct. The weather is changing."

She slid her cup over and tipped her head. She wanted to hear more, but she needed something to hear it with.

Saul refilled her cup and slid it back to her while he continued. "Whatever Kara is, isn't as important as why she's here. She's determined to find Earth, and it may be a gods damned Cylon trap, but there maybe something else your forgetting here..."

"Oh? And what would that be?"

"You've been living for one thing for so damned long, and now some young upstart has come out of the blue and is about to take away your one chance at glory - and it burns you. Admit it Madame President, out of all the things the now not-dead Kara Thrace could have announced, lighting the way to Earth was not what you wanted to hear."

He watched her stretch her neck to the side, readjusting a knot that had probably started as soon as Kara's voice came over the comm. She pursed her bottom lip, and looked down at the floor before looking back at him. The moment wasn't long enough for her to bite back with some catty reply, but he was hoping she would offer him something.

"You're right." He didn't get time to restrain his surprise before she continued. "I bet you don't hear that very often."

She put her drink down and walked around to his side of the desk to take a look at the view from his angle. "I have a chair like this desk. It houses everything from clothes, photos, and books I'm determined to read one day, but probably won't. People give me things. I tell them not to. I'm going to die, I would have thought the gifts would stop."

"We're all going to die Roslin. Did you ever think that them giving you some useless junk is more about them than you?"

"I need to find Earth. Everything else is a distraction."

"And what if you do? Find Earth that is, then what? Maybe you should pick up those books you haven't read and start reading. A little distraction...That's all some of us have."

Laura made a noise that resembled a scoff and got out of her chair. She pushed the chair a little harshly against the floor, and it made her wince at the scraping sound.

"This list," she said, picking up the folder on his desk."...I don't want it. Whatever you said in Baltar's trial doesn't matter anymore. I pardoned everyone for the events on New Caprica. If someone wants to hold you accountable for Ellen's death, then they can add it the commission's catalog. There is no point implicating yourself."

"She shouldn't have died."

He didn't mean to say it, but everything about Ellen came with an immediate response - grief.

No amount of training could prevent him from responding. He missed her. More than that, he felt the weight of her death more keenly than any other past sin. He now knew what he was, and every time he saw his reflection he knew what had killed her. A Cylon killed her, the one that stared back at him every morning he faced the mirror.

"If you didn't do it, someone else would have."

Roslin was at his side, leaning against the desk, she bent slightly to try and gauge his reaction. It was the closest she'd ever been to him. She knew it was a risk, he was highly volatile - but she also knew that his anger was directed at himself.

Saul didn't understand this woman at all. What part of Ellen's death would help her secure a power play against Kara? Why even bring it up? His frustration towards her meddling only became confused by her proximity. There was a warmness about her that stood in stark contrast to what he knew of her personality. With her face inches from his he could detect the slightest scent of alcohol mixed with a floral perfume. She must use it sparingly because he never noticed it before - or maybe he'd never been close enough to notice it. For a moment he closed his eye and thought Ellen was in the room, and just as quickly he created some distance and rubbing his hand against his face feigned tiredness over daydreaming.

"Saul, no one is going to blame you for her death. It was an unfortunate response to a very precarious situation—"

"A response? Is that what we're calling it?"

He pushed his chair back further, scrapping it against the cold metal floor. Getting up, he slammed the chair against the cot beside him. Any temptations to reminisce on warm feelings were now once again being replaced with anger.

"The Cylons have a way of making us all murderers. You're not alone in this." She said, attempting to console him.

"Gods!" Saul raked his hand across his face, loosening his shoulders, the face that appeared under his hand was confused and insulted.

"She would have let them die to prevent me from going back there. She just... she was never accustomed to having any part of her life out of her control—"

"Including you." Laura added.

Saul had turned away from her, and maybe she thought she had got too close. Maybe she shouldn't have given her opinion on Ellen, but she couldn't speak with Tigh without seeing the feint outline of the woman who more often clung to him, than stood by him. There just wasn't a way of reaching him without touching her.

"I ah, I should go. Thank you for your time." Laura began as she motioned to exit.

"Wait," he said, turning to face her. "...you didn't get what you wanted."

Laura moved a step closer to him, restoring the distance they had before. Then thinking better of it, she motioned back slightly, ignoring his look of puzzlement. "I got what I needed to hear, and perhaps a little insight into what I'm going to hear. It's um… I'm not accustomed to such frankness - not since, well not since Billy. What he lacked in confidence, he made up in articulate moments of courage."

Saul nodded. She hadn't mentioned the boy in months. He'd always been one step behind or beside her. She was a lone wolf now. Sure she had Tory, but Tory didn't need Roslin like Billy had. He needed her direction, like she needed someone to direct.

Laura turned to leave, and Saul picked up his file.

"Wait," he said, forcing her to turn around.

He had waited for her to turn back, and he looked down at his file. Everything was there, not just Ellen, but everything he didn't know what to do with. A catalogue of sins, that he'd poured out onto paper after the trial. He had thought in his own way that putting it all on paper would take it from his heart. That the burden would ease, and that some how he could justify his own failings.

Laura watched his hands and saw the subtle shaking as he tentatively grasped the file. A few moments ago she could have dismissed his behaviour as the result of his drinking, but something else was there.

"I'll take it," she said. He looked up immediately and she added, "I'll keep it, if you take mine."

Laura reached into her pocket and rubbed her hands over a worn scrap of paper that never left her side. She took a deep breath and handed it over to him. His one eye was wide with interested as he took the paper from her in exchange for the file.

"I'm sure the gods have a lot more to add, but this one…This one, has a way of reminding me of all of them."

He turned the paper over in his hands and noticed some faint handwriting, _Olympic Carrier_.

He nodded his head, folded the note, and put it back in his pocket.

"You sure you don't want another drink Madame President?"

For the first time since she entered the room he saw something like a smile.

"No, thank you. That drink of yours is the first I've had in a while, and between you and me, I might need to sleep it off for a bit."

"Of course," he replied. He remembered she was staying in Bill's quarters for the time being, so at least she wouldn't have to walk far.

As she started to leave again he remembered something else on his desk.

"Wait," he said, watching her turn around again.

"Before you go," he replied, moving some of the junk off the top of his desk. "Here, take this."

He handed her a silk scarf that was tastefully decorated with a pattern of small butterflies.

"Um," she struggled to reply, putting Saul's file under her arm as she let her fingers trail over the soft material.

"It was Ellen's. I can't keep it." He added.

She opened her mouth slightly, but wasn't sure what to say and closed it just as quickly.

"To be honest, she hated it — and she would have loved to hate it on you."

Laura's eyes widened, and she looked from the scarf to Saul. She tried to read him, but his face remained passive and unmoving. Looking back at the scarf she tried to imagine something so delicate on the vivacious woman she had known, and the image of her twirling around with the scarf made her burst out in laughter.

"Oh I'm sorry," she managed to say in between guffaws. "Really?" she added.

Saul was smiling at her and made a note to himself to remember this moment next time Laura Roslin pissed him off. Saul took the scarf off her and Laura looking some-what confused watched as he gently placed it around her shoulders.

She was beautiful, if you were into women like her. And he wondered if in another circumstance, were the weight not so keenly fixed on her shoulders as it was, could she live as free spirited as that small moment of laughter indicated.

While she smiled at him, just as quietly something else descended on her. He watched her nod her head and utter a small thank you, before turning and closing the hatch behind her.

He walked back to his desk, looking at the clock he began tidying up. It wouldn't be long before something else would shift the ground beneath his feet, and this mess was just another distraction.

The weather is changing.

.

.

* * *

 **A/N:** The scarf Saul gave her is the same one she wears during _The Hub_ while she walks around the Galactica with Elosha. I decided to Head canon that it was once Ellen's and Saul gave it to her.


End file.
